Category: DOA: Hollywood - Dan Fiorella: Writer @ large

Dan Fiorella

DOA: Hollywood; Halloween Edition - Amity Mayoral Debate

10/29/2019

TMI: Hollwood produces a live TOPICAL show each week, every Sunday. And by "every" we mean "many." Not everything submitted gets in. And not everything that gets rejected has a shelf life.

Again, I'm really satisfied with this sketch. Back in that summer it had been mentioned to me, as I noted in the forward of the skit, Politics is unpredictable. Like, did you ever notice that the mayor in "Jaws" is still the mayor in "Jaws 2?" How’d that happen?

It was something my son-in-law pointed out to me and it started to flesh itself out into a sketch over time, a perfect Halloween/Election Day combo that seems more common now as horror and politics have gotten more intertwined. Sure, there's a couple of typos and I left the name "Watt" in one place after I changed it to "Carla." So many Jaws Easter eggs in it. And it had some decent bits for the woman in the cast. And some really good throw-away lines and the Abby & Grace characters came out of left field, but really work in this context. Alas, it wasn't produced, but I hope you'll enjoy it now.

1977 Amity Mayoral Debate

DOA: Hollywood; Halloween Edition-Halloween Hearings

10/28/2019

TMI: Hollwood produces a live TOPICAL show each week, every Sunday. And by "every" we mean "many." Not everything submitted gets in. And not everything that gets rejected has a shelf life.

In 2018, we were watching a lot of unqualified people get nominated to a lot of important government jobs. The Kavanaugh hearings were very much in the news that autumn and it seemed like a good mix; Halloween and political humor. I was very happy with this sketch. I'm a fan of the Halloween movies and could really picture Jamie Lee Curtis playing the part. The length was good, it had a decent number of characters, each with a moment and it really flowed well. I thought I made a solid political parody without naming names but the gang didn't use it, so here we present....

Senate Halloween Hearings

DOA: Hollywood; Halloween Edition-Scary Things

10/26/2019

TMI: Hollwood produces a live TOPICAL show each week, every Sunday. And by "every" we mean "many." Not everything submitted gets in. And not everything that gets rejected has a shelf life.

I had a nice creative spark back in October 2018. A lot of inspiration for bits to submit. Some inspiration came from babysitting my grandkids. They were young and watching a LOT of Disney Jr. and other age-appropriate things. But after awhile, things like Vampirina and Netflix's Super Monsters started to grate on my old-school Universal-era horror movie fandom. So, this skit was born. I was really happy with it, it had a solid beginning, middle and end. I think I nailed the sit-com tone. I got to do some goofy jokes and vent on about "these kids today and their monsters." As for the group, it was an good-size cast, each character had a moment. Granted it wasn't super topical, but I thought it had a great show-business vibe that I thought the group would appreciate. I was disappointed it didn't get in for their Halloween show. You'd think I'd be used to disappointment by now, right?

Disney’s Scary Thingies

DOA: Hollywood; Halloween Edition: Jekyll & Sober

10/24/2019

TMI: Hollwood produces a live TOPICAL show each week, every Sunday. And by "every" we mean "many." Not everything submitted gets in. And not everything that gets rejected has a shelf life.

Sometimes you think of the perfect holiday sketch a week after the holiday. Well, thanks to modern technology, I can now write it up and mark in in my computer calendar so it will remind me to submit it next year. That's what happened here. This Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde parody popped into my head around Halloween 2017, but too late to submit it to the group. So I wrote it up and waited a 12 months.

I really liked the flow, the characters, the internal logic of the premise; it was a joy writing it up. I only wished they had done it (womp, womp). Then I waited a year to post it here (at least I think I did. I checked the blog and couldn't find it. I couldn't remember if I posted it or decided to wait for Halloween). So, here is...

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Sobriety

DOA:Hollywood - Hollywood Director (4/2019)

7/31/2019

TMI: Hollwood produces a live TOPICAL show each week, every Sunday. And by "every" we mean "many." Not everything submitted gets in. And not everything that gets rejected has a shelf life.

Sometimes my material isn't so much topical as locational. A couple ideas occurred to me while walking the dog; they were both Hollywood-related ideas. I think I had just seen a promo on TCM for a Jackie Cooper movie and it made me think of that old story of how they got Cooper to cry in movies; by saying his dog was dead. I just extrapolated from there to come up with this little ditty. TMI: Hollywood took a pass, but if TCM ever does a sketch show, I'm submitted this!

Hollywood Director

DOA: Hollywood - To Tell The Truth D.C. Edition (4/19)

7/12/2019

TMI: Hollywood started as a parody of all things Hollywood. Then they started dealing with the wider pop-culture. Now, politics has merged into pop-culture, so they are doing more political stuff. They try to limit it, or run issues through the Hollywood looking glass, which, face it, is very easy to do with Trump in the White House. We can all write "Trump is Stupid" gags until the cows come home (but we know, under this administration that a lot of cows won't be coming home) but how do handle news that hasn't been hammered to death by late-night shows, other comics and Twitter? It's tricky. And to put all that effort into a sketch that has a slim chance to make it (especially coming from an outsider on the wrong coast) is daunting. So here's what happens...

Naturally, Press Secretary and Official Fibber was in the news during April, coming up with wacky explanations for her boss' wackier behavior. Also, ABC started running its ads for their summer game shows. There's "To Tell The Truth" right smack in the middle of things; how could I not? I learned from noted writer and late, lamented online friend John Boni that you can't just plop out a sketch or article or anything with just one note, so, sure, Sarah's a liar, so let's do variations on that. But I can go further by picking the right "celebrities" to question her and play around with the 2 other contestants. I think I had a nice mix of gags and zingers in this sketch. But, it didn't make the cut. So, we present...

To Tell The Truth D.C. Edition

DOA: Hollywood - Movie End Game (5/19)

6/17/2019

The TMI season was coming to an end and I wanted to get one solid pop-culture bit out there. I was really struggling for an idea. Then we went to see Avengers: End Game. I was suddenly obsessed with the idea of a 3-hour movie with no intermission. A joke of amusing thoughts came to me to describe the situation, then I idea of a skit slowly started to form. Once the idea of a staff-Sargent-type life coach popped up, I started to assemble a bit about training people to make it through the movie. I got in some spoiler jokes, some end credit movie scene jokes and a lot of pee-pee jokes. It all came together nicely, although not nicely enough to get picked for the show. Oh, well, that's what blogs are for, right?

Movie End Game

DOA: Hollywood - Office of Thrones (5/19)

6/14/2019

So, there was this show, Game of Thrones--maybe you heard of it--and the series finale was the same night as the last show of the season for TMI. I don't have HBO so I never watched the show (I've just started reading the books, so no spoilers!). Not one to look a golden goose in the mouth, HBO announced future spin-offs and sequels. And then mentioned they would be showing a documentary about the final season. I instantly thought about a documentary of the show's events, which quickly assembled itself into an Office parody. It's written as a stage sketch, so there's a lot of right stage/left stage action as people step forward to address the "camera." I thought it came out pretty good.
Alas, the show is gone, and so is this sketch's chance of getting selected again.

Office of Thrones

DOA: Hollywood - American Greetings (3/19)

6/12/2019

TMI: Hollwood produces a live TOPICAL show each week, every Sunday. And by "every" we mean "many." Not everything submitted gets in. And not everything that gets rejected has a shelf life. As has been my long-stated premise, topical sketches don't age well. If it doesn't get picked it falls to the wayside. For the last year or so I've been giving my orphan sketches a home on the blog. For instance...

The big news in March 2019 was the college admissions scandal, where the FBI uncovered a huge scam where a guy was getting money to bribe officials, alter SAT scores and fake high school achievements for kids to get into college while pretending to donate to charity. Actress Lori Loughlin got caught in the net and it went badly for her; arrested. Lost her job on "Fuller House" and "When Calls the Heart," and was basically banned from all things Hallmark. She was in the process of becoming the face of the company's cable offerings and that abruptly ended. So I wrote up a quick bit for TMI to play with. I was thinking of it as a video commercial parody, but it would have worked as a cold open as well. Didn't make the cut for either. While the story plays out, the initial shock and TV images have faded, so the bit really can't be salvaged, so let's just post it here, shall we?

American Greetings

DOA: Hollywood: The Ariana Grande - (3/19)

6/10/2019

TMI: Hollwood produces a live TOPICAL show each week, every Sunday. And by "every" we mean "most." Not everything submitted gets in. And not everything that gets rejected has a shelf life. As has been my long-stated premise, topical sketches don't age well. If it doesn't get picked it falls to the wayside. For the last year or so I've been giving my orphan sketches a home on the blog. For instance...

-Back in March 2019, Starbucks announced it was partnering up with singer and celeb Ariana Grande to create a special beverage. The jokes wrote themselves...from the TMI Minute where I wrote she was licking each coffee cup personally, to a more elaborate "cold opening" I wrote for the stage show. I was in an "old-timey" mood that week and created a short Abbott & Costello-like routine. I even made it more topical by referencing presidential candidate, John Hickenlooper. And if that doesn't date a skit, nothing will. While my one liner was used on the TMI Minute, the sketch didn't make the cut for the stage show. So, here it is. Perhaps out of touch, it's still polling better than John Hickenlooper...

The Ariana Grande

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